What do we ask of friendship except to be taken for what we pretend to be – and without having to pretend. ~Robert Brault

On the occasions I travel for business my usual dinner consists of soup, salad and a glass of white in my hotel room.  I’m usually catching up on email and completing anything I left hanging from the day.  This time some combination of good weather, good meetings and proximity to my friend Laura led me to send an email, subject: You Around?

Laura and I have close to nothing in common.  We are both women in the car business (enough said) and can both craft quite the snappy email on occasion.  We’ve been sending those emails back and forth for probably eight years?  I don’t even know how long.  On my visits to the dealership where she handles warranty administration there has never been time to sit down for a meal or even have a ten minute conversation.  I think the management of the dealership would switch into a paranoid frenzy if they thought for one minute we were talking about them, which oddly enough we don’t…and perhaps she might find herself in an uncomfortable position if they knew we were friends.

Up until now we’ve been friends through email.  But you know how you know that some people are just your kind of person.  They are genuine and funny and out of the ordinary and if you just had a minute to sit down and hear their story you would be instant old  friends.

So through whatever good fortune we were able to meet for dinner.  As the hours ticked by like minutes we shared our stories and boy we two have very interesting stories. There was not an uncomfortable moment in those hours.   I thoroughly enjoyed our visit and her stories of partner and kids and adventures and talents and how she came to be where she was and the person she’s become all more interesting and genuine than I could have imagined.

I couldn’t be more glad that we have little in common but the car business, we barely touched on cars, because there is so much more richness in the uncommonality  of us.  I think by the time we said goodbye we both realized our friendship was going to be a long and interesting one regardless of how often we see each other.  Love that…glad you were around and thanks for coming to Peabody!